


White Sheep

by arysteia



Category: Original Work
Genre: Actual A+ Parenting, Gen, Homage Meets Pastiche, M/M, Orphans Thermidor, Superhero in a Family of Supervillains, White Sheep of the Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-03-17 04:24:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18957808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arysteia/pseuds/arysteia
Summary: Finding your way in the world can be tough. Finding your way as a sorta kinda maybe wannabe superhero in a family of supervillains takes it to a whole new level.





	White Sheep

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FleetSparrow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FleetSparrow/gifts).



> For Fleetsparrow. I had a lot of fun writing this, I really hope you enjoy reading it.

There _must_ be more humiliating things in life than being rescued from a tree like a goddamn kitten by Ultraman himself, but right at that moment, cradled in said Ultraman’s muscular yet gentle arms, Jack couldn’t think of a single one of them.

“Okay, okay,” he said, when they were a safe distance away from the combined environmental catastrophe and monster attack unfolding behind them. “You can put me down now. I can make it from here.”

“There’s still some residual liquefaction under the surface,” Ultraman said dubiously, scanning the earth beneath them with what Jack assumed was his enhanced vision.

“No, seriously,” Jack insisted. “Just drop me at the nearest highway and I can get home fine on my own.”

That seemed to clinch something in Ultraman’s mind, because he shook his head firmly, and said, “No, your father would never forgive me if I did that. I’ll take you to the house.”

Great. There’d never been much hope that Ultraman hadn’t recognised him - even with Rex’s threats to bankrupt or kneecap any paparazzo who dared to take, or editor who dared to publish, a photograph of any of his sons during their childhood or adolescence, there’d been more than enough time since Jack turned eighteen six months ago for a few grainy shots taken with telephoto lenses to leak out - but Jack had clung to it nonetheless.

“He’ll never forgive you anyway,” he said petulantly, then instantly regretted it as Ultraman’s handsome face fell. Making Megalopolis’ most beloved superhero sad felt like the worst crime Jack could possibly commit without actually joining the family business. “Sorry,” he added quickly. “That was mean.”

“It’s fine,” Ultraman said tightly, but instead of the usual cheery small talk he was famed for maintaining, even in the direst of emergencies, they flew the rest of the way back to Stately Ruger Manor in steely silence.

Rex was waiting for them on the exquisitely manicured lawn when they arrived. His look of worry quickly gave way to anger as they landed and Jack walked towards him under his own steam.

“I’m fine, Dad,” he started, but Rex cut him off with an angry wave of his hand.

“Don’t play the dad card,” he said coldly, “You’re far too old for that to work.”

Holy shit, he really was furious. The dad card _always_ worked, even if Rex had only ever admitted how much the occasional sobriquet meant to him when extremely drunk one Father’s Day. Jack hurried inside, but not fast enough to avoid hearing Rex and Ultraman start shouting at each other, swiftly followed by the sonic boom as Ultraman took off for wherever he went to lick his wounds after being emotionally devastated by a fragile mortal with no superpowers.

Jack headed to the kitchen to make himself a cup of hot cocoa to take upstairs.

“You’re. In. Trou-ble,” Damon singsonged from the counter where he was eating a bowl of honey puffs the size of his head.

“Whatever, brat,” Jack snapped. “Don’t you have homework to do?”

“Only science fair,” Damon said. “Father _was_ helping me work on my miniaturised particle accelerator until we got the alert that you and your eco terrorist friends were wreaking havoc and risking your lives while utterly failing to smash capitalism.”

“I know a thing or two about rebellion, and wanting to leave the nest,” Luke interrupted, appearing suddenly in a flash of green light, “But don’t you think it was _somewhat_ cruel, embarrassing Rex like that? Bad enough to be spotted protesting your own father’s company’s environmental policies, but being filmed getting rescued by his most hated nemesis? It only hit twitter nineteen minutes ago, but it’s already been retweeted 1694 times. And the tourist who filmed it has given permission to every news outlet but the Daily Mail and Fox News to use it, so I’d give you about an hour before someone recognises you and it goes from cute human interest story to viral tale of Oedipal machinations and a cudgel for Rex’s enemies to beat him with.”

“Oh, _God_ ,” Jack said, “I didn’t mean for it to be a big deal. It was just supposed to be a low key practice run, save a single oak that developers wanted to bulldoze to extend a parking lot, I didn’t know they were dumping illegal waste and the thing was going to come to life and try to eat me. Wait. Rex owns Ferco Industries?”

“Thirty six percent of it, not the controlling interest,” Luke said, as though that made a difference. “But it’s a publicly listed company, someone will make the connection and it’ll make the evening news. You really didn’t know?”

“No!” Jack blurted. “If I had, I would have _talked_ to Rex, not caused a scene in public.”

“Well,” Luke said. “That’s very mature of you. Unfortunately he does, and you did. And worse than that, he had to thank Ultraman for rescuing you, so congrats on the trifecta.”

Damon looked up at that. “Wow,” he said. “He _thanked_ him?”

“No,” Jack said.

“Yes,” Luke said.

“Then what was all the shouting?”

“That started after Ultraman said you were a fine young man and Rex should be very proud of you.”

Oh, _God_ , it just kept getting worse.

Luke laughed. “If we didn’t know from long experience that Ultraman doesn’t have an insincere bone in his perfect Elkonian body, I’d bow down and swear allegiance to the unchallenged king of the trolls. Imagine telling the biggest crime boss in Megalopolis that his parenting skills are second to none, and that you really admire the values he’s instilled in his son.”

Jack abandoned his half made cocoa and fled upstairs.

* * *

Rex knocked on the bedroom door a few hours later. He didn’t look mad anymore when he came in, just awkwardly embarrassed, which matched the way Jack felt, and he was holding Jack’s favourite mug, steam curling out of the top of it, so Jack shifted to sit up against the headboard of his bed and made room for Rex to sit down beside him, like he always used to do when Jack was a little boy.

“I’m really sorry, Rex,” he said after taking a sip of the expertly made cocoa, exactly the way he liked it, thick and sweet and with an extra mountain of whipped cream and grated chocolate piled high on top. “I didn’t know you owned Ferco.”

“That’s okay,” Rex said. “I didn’t know we were conducting illegal experiments there, let alone dumping lab waste in the river. I thought it was actually a legitimate enterprise, so I guess we’re even on the not doing due diligence front.”

“You’ve got to be more careful with that,” Jack said. It was an old bone of contention between them, but he was an adult now and couldn’t keep turning a blind eye to Rex’s more questionable choices. He ought to at least be _deliberate_ in his villainy.

“I employ ten thousand people,” Rex said tiredly. “Do you really expect me to pay attention to every little factory? What were you even doing there?”

Jack shrugged. “You told me to make sure I joined things during Orientation Week,” he said. “I joined the Environmental Club.”

Rex laughed. “I meant for you to join a sports team, maybe the drama club. Go in for debate, or student council, or something useful.”

“I really did try to get out of it without shouting for Ultraman,” Jack said. “If it had just been the asphalt collapsing I probably would have made it. But once the tree started actively trying to trip me, and pull me into the root structure, I couldn’t get out in time before the cracks were too wide.”

Rex looked like he’d bitten into a lemon, but he didn’t hesitate when he said, “Of course I would want you to call for him if you were seriously in danger. That’s not even a question.”

Jack smiled. He’d never really doubted that was the case. “Do you think you and Ultraman will ever make up?” he asked, pushing his luck just a bit.

Rex looked surprised, which wasn’t something you got to see often. “Of course not,” he said. “Why would we? That’s not something long term nemeses typically do.”

“Oh, come on,” Jack said. “I’m not Damon, I don’t think your life started when we were born. I know you and he were friends when you were young.”

Rex’s jaw dropped. “What on earth do you mean?” he asked.

This was dangerous ground, but Jack forged on boldly anyway. “I’m not blind,” he said. “The only other person I’ve ever seen make you as angry as Ultraman is Dirk Dent, and once I started looking closely the resemblance was _uncanny_.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Rex asked, smiling fondly. “But you’d be surprised how vanishingly few people have ever noticed. Which mostly just confirms that I’m right when I tell you how unforgivably stupid most people in Megalopolis are, despite your feeble protestations.”

“ _Rex_ ,” Jack protested, not feebly at all, but Rex was looking serious again.

“Have you told anyone else?” he asked.

“Of course not.”

“Good. Don’t.” Rex stood up to leave. “It’s important.”

“Why?” Jack asked. “Because you _do_ want to make up one day?”

Rex sighed and shook his head, but he stopped in the doorway for a moment to say, “Because some things are off limits, even for nemeses. Dirk’s parents. You boys. A few good memories of when we were kids. We all need to do the right thing sometimes.”

He sounded sad now, and Jack didn’t know what to say to that, so instead he said, “You’ll clean up the dump site, though, right?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ll shut down the company?”

“Yes.”

“And maybe make a donation to an environmental charity, and make all the managers from the plant take mandatory ethics PD?”

Rex glared at him, but his eyes were crinkling round the edges. “I’m not sure I’m getting a good return on investment with you,” he said, as sternly as he could. “You’re more expensive than all your brothers put together.”

“I love you, Dad.”

Rex smiled for real. “I love you too, Jack. Good night.”

See? The dad card _always_ worked.

* * *

All happy families are alike, but all unhappy families are unhappy in their own way. So said Tolstoy, but what did he know. Jack might only be a first year undergrad, but growing up a Ruger he’d read more than enough Great Literature, and attended sufficient cocktail parties, corporate benefits, and childhood birthday parties, to know that the one great delineating factor of _all_ families, supervillain or otherwise, was their inability to get through a holiday weekend without screaming, crying, plate smashing, or, in extreme cases, knife fights.

Rex Ruger’s Mid Summer Non-Denominational Familial Thanksgiving Dinner, held defiantly on June 25 each year, was the only social occasion on any calendar currently in use that it was impossible to postpone or cancel, for any reason. It was the one day of the year that Rex required all five of his sons to come home, no matter what pressing business they might have, or think they had, elsewhere.

Jack and Damon were the only two still living in the mansion, though Luke tended to come home every time he’d had a fight with Theo, which was surprisingly often. No one else could understand what Luke saw in Theo, who was, to all outward appearances, a big, dumb, Scandinavian bruiser, blatantly at Megalopolis University on an athletic scholarship - it was the first time their ice hockey team had ever been competitive - but Jack rather liked him, and not just for his tan and his chiselled blond good looks, which contrasted nicely with Luke’s pale, dark features. He’d always been friendly and kind, taking the time to discuss his secret love of astronomy with his on-off boyfriend’s nerdy younger brother. He was also very much the chas _er_ , rather than the chas _ee_ , when it came to the relationship, which said good things about both his taste, and his sense of commitment.

Henry, on the other hand, the oldest of the brothers, had a tendency to show up every year with a different stunningly attractive brunette woman on his arm. In that, he was a chip off the old block, even down to the hair, and the diamond earrings he usually gave as parting gifts. He was in his last year at law school, and very much the “good son”, poised to graduate with first class honours in commercial law, and delight Rex’s heart by joining Rexcorp’s in house legal counsel. For those times when you need someone you can _really_ trust. Unusually, today he arrived alone.

Jack gave him a welcome home hug in the vestibule, and he abused his elder brother privileges, as he always did, by ruffling Jack’s hair. Jack shoved him off and tried to flatten his hair back down while looking in the floor length solid gold Louis Quatorze mirror.

“No supermodels free this year?” he asked, giving up on the most stubborn cowlick.

“Plenty,” Henry said airily, then abruptly looked serious. “I wanted to bring Bryce with me actually, he’s been more depressed than ever lately, and I don’t trust him not to spend the whole time I’m away brooding on the roof.”

Bryce was Henry’s best friend and roommate, and just as much of an inveterate womaniser, to the point where Jack sometimes wondered if they needed their heads knocked together. It was probably for the best they both lived so permanently on the banks of the Nile, though; the company he’d inherited at his parents’ untimely deaths was Rexcorp’s biggest - or only - rival in multiple industries, and even if Bryce had left it to the stewardship of others since childhood, he must know that Rex fully intended to absorb it at some point in the not too distant future. It was one thing to jeopardise a lifelong friendship for a hostile takeover that would expand the Ruger empire into Vikburg, quite another to destroy a great romance.

“What about you though, short stuff?” Henry asked. “No romantic entanglements on your horizon?”

Jack blushed. “No,” he said. “Come on. Rex is in the library.”

“Of course,” Henry said, smiling. “Best not keep the pater waiting.”

Eryn was the last to arrive, fashionably late for cocktails, but safely before dinner was served. Even he didn’t dare risk Rex’s wrath that openly.

“What on earth are you wearing?” Rex asked when he saw him, hastily swallowing a mouthful of 1982 Macallan that at six hundred dollars a bottle deserved better treatment.

“Oh, like purple isn’t your favourite colour too,” Eryn said rudely, gesturing at Rex’s crisp lilac shirt and handknitted Florentine silk tie in a delightful shade of plum.

“I’ve never worn a fuschia shirt under a magenta suit,” Rex spluttered. It was true. His impeccably tailored suits were always an inky black from which no light escaped. Jack rather suspected otherworldly intervention.

“It’s my ‘bathed in the blood of my enemies’ suit,” Eryn said, with his typical bombast. Jack peered at him more closely, but he did appear to be speaking metaphorically.

Luke elbowed Jack and hissed, “He’ll be wearing a cape next.”

“I like it,” Damon said suddenly. “Very Tyrian.”

A gong struck just in time, summoning them all to dinner.

* * *

They sat down at the long table in the formal dining room. It officially seated a dozen, but with the spare chairs removed it left enough elbow room for the six of them without the risk of jostling leading to all out war, and more than enough space for every kind of dish that any of them might hope for. Eryn hadn’t kept kosher since his teens, but Rex had always been scrupulous about avoiding any sort of food that had religious or cultural connotations, instead letting each of them nominate a single course every year, on a strict rotational basis. There were colour coded spreadsheets and everything. Rex took his customary place at the head of the table, Henry at the foot, and the others sat down in strict order of age, Eryn and Luke at Rex’s right and left hands, Jack and Damon at Henry’s.

Last year Damon had suggested that as Rex’s only biological son he should by rights get the seat at the foot of the table, and dinner had ended with him hanging by his heels from the chandelier, an action that communicated effectively that Henry might well be without meta powers, but his temper was as frightening as anyone else in the family’s, and given the way it could turn on a dime, perhaps even more so. Rex had refrained from comment, but from the way he left Damon there squawking while they all ate dessert, a magnificent creme brulée, his feelings on the matter were not hard to fathom.

Once everyone was seated and the champagne - or sparkling cider in Damon’s case - was poured, Rex made his customary toast to family. As usual, he thanked no higher power, but rather acknowledged the complicated workings of fate that had had him in exactly the right place at the right time, not once but four times, to pick up a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest, and a fifth, more literally, coming home to find the product of yet another failed liaison on the actual physical doorstep. It was a well practised speech by now, but he meant every word, and it always reminded Jack how lucky they all were to have built their little family, and how proud he was to be part of it, even if… Well. There was plenty of time for a few more rounds of drinks before he had to broach the subject of ‘even if’. 

They got through oysters, soup, and salad, and the three accompanying exquisitely chosen wines, without fireworks, and by the time they were tucking into a truly magnificent lobster thermidor, Jack judged everyone except the juice swigging Damon to be sufficiently mellow to make his announcement.

He cleared his throat nervously. Everyone looked up expectantly.

“There’s something I have to tell you all,” he said.

“Yes,” Eryn said around a mouthful of lobster. He really was in a terrible mood tonight. “You’re gay. We know. We’ve sat through this speech twice before. We’re all gay. Rex still loves us.” 

“I’m not gay,” Henry said.

“I wouldn’t bet your inheritance on it,” Luke said. “Overcompensation is a thing.”

Henry flushed scarlet, though whether it was in embarrassment or in anger was anyone’s guess. Perhaps both.

“I’m not either,” Damon said. “Not that there’s anything wrong with it!” he added quickly, clearly remembering the unfortunate incident with the chandelier.

Rex stayed quiet, but it was obvious from the thoughtful look on his face that he a) wasn’t particularly surprised by this news, and b) knew that it wasn’t actually what Jack had been tying himself in knots trying to say.

“I’m dropping out of university to join the Peace Corps,” Jack blurted. The cacophony in the room died instantly, everyone staring at him in stunned silence. “I won’t be going to work at Rexcorp when I get back, either,” he went on. “Or joining the Fraternity of Evil Metas.” Henry smirked as Eryn glared. “ _Or_ the Unfairness Guild.” Henry stopped smiling too, and Luke started laughing. Damon’s eyes were as wide as saucers. Rex was still worryingly silent. “I think I want to be a school teacher.”

Luke looked at him quizzically. “You know you need more than one semester of college to teach, right?” he asked. “Even in this economy.”

Eryn slammed his hands down on the table before Jack could answer. “You can be a teacher if you want to,” he hissed, “but you still have to join the family business. We all work two jobs.”

“It’s not up to you!” Jack said, casting a desperate eye at Rex.

“Do you think I _wanted_ to be a chemical engineer?” Eryn shouted, and his face was flushed nearly as dark as his jacket. “I wanted to build _bridges_!”

“Is this about a boy?” Henry asked quietly, almost gently. That was the thing about his temper; it flared when you didn’t expect it, never when you did.

“No!” Jack said. It _wasn’t_. Hailing from an entire family of known supervillains didn’t _help_ in the dating game, but even with youthful hormones working against him he was capable of thinking about other, more important, things.

“Sit down, Eryn,” Rex said, speaking for the first time.

“Tell him I’m right,” Eryn said defiantly, still standing.

“I said to sit down,” Rex said. “This is my house, and my table, and I taught you better manners than this.”

“I broke up with Carl for you,” Eryn shouted, and he was definitely mad at Rex now, not Jack. The heavy silverware on the table started rattling as his hands clenched. “I asked him to marry me, and _he said no_. He said _we wanted different things_. And I couldn’t disagree, because we do want different bloody things. He wants to save the world, and I prioritise _this family_.”

There was a moment of horrified silence. Eryn and Carl had been dating since grad school, and they’d somehow always made it work, even when Eryn had started at RugerChem and Carl had gone off to join a not for profit genetics lab, working on cut price cures for childhood diseases. No wonder he’d been in such a foul temper all night.

“You could have _lied_ to him,” Luke said, breaking the silence at last. “That’s the beauty of being a villain, you don’t have to be scrupulously honest. I lie to Theo all the time.”

“You’re a _trickster_!” Eryn yelled, wheeling on Luke. “How could I lie convincingly, even if I wanted to, when he would never stop reading my mind?”

“Pay a spell caster,” Luke said. “Learn to shield properly. Make some sort of helmet.” He seemed angry too now, though whether it was at Eryn, or Jack, or even the absent Theo, was anybody’s guess. “You could have had it all,” he added.

Every piece of cutlery and flatware, including the soup tureen, flung itself across the table at Luke. Luke decorporealised with a green gold glimmer, allowing the last of the soup to splatter all over the far wall and the knives to embed themselves in the late period Jackson Pollock, which fortunately for everyone wasn’t one of Rex’s favourites.

So that was the screaming, the broken dishes, and the knives, all in one go, and Jack himself felt very close to tears. Trifecta indeed.

Eryn stormed out in its wake, the door slamming after him.

“Was it something I said?” Luke asked, feigning wide eyed innocence.

Rex looked at him witheringly, and Luke sensibly shut up.

“I want this place cleaned up by the time I get back,” Rex said, flicking a few golden beads of beluga caviar off his lapel and following after Eryn. “And you’d better hope I catch him.”

Henry went with him, and a few minutes later there was the sound of Rex’s Ferrari peeling out of the gates.

Jack started half heartedly picking up shards of glass, and wondered if it was all worth it, or whether he couldn’t _learn_ to love being a corporate shark and part time supervillain. Rex certainly seemed to enjoy his work, both parts of it, and Luke had found his niche in the PR department; surely Jack could make a success of it if he tried.

“Oh, let me do that,” Luke said, and he waved a hand, returning the dining room to its former pristine state, even the Pollock knitting itself back together. Damon absconded to the media room with an entire pavlova in one hand and the chocolate mousse that Jack had requested in the other. Jack let him go.

“You shouldn’t have said that,” he said instead. It had been unusually unkind, even for Luke.

Luke smiled at him. “Sometimes it’s better to let the chaos out early,” he said. “Before anyone can say anything they’ll really regret later. My silly suggestions provoked Eryn’s sense of drama, but they won’t have really hurt him. And maybe once he’s calmed down he’ll realise that the best thing to do is actually the opposite. Talk it out and tell the truth.”

Jack looked at him in baffled admiration. “How did _you_ wind up the well adjusted one?” he asked.

Luke shrugged. “Who can say? Just. I was the _actually abandoned_ one, you know? Rex literally found me on the sidewalk in the snow one winter. So maybe he was more careful with me? I don’t know. I was the obvious problem child, especially when I was a kid and changing colour from blue to pink every night, but Rex always told me he’d love me no matter what, and if I wanted to know who my birth parents were he’d help me find them, but if I didn’t that was cool too. Or if I wanted him to hunt them down and have them killed, then that was no big either. Once your dad’s said that to you, there’s really not much room for teen angst.”

Jack nodded.

“And then when everyone else had their dinosaur phase, and I was super into snakes, and he just said, “Shape shift if you want to, but stop stabbing your brothers, I’ve already put half the case workers at CPS’ kids through college, I don’t want to have to pay for their retirement too.”

That was very like Rex, and it made them both smile.

“Do you actually lie to Theo?” Jack asked at last.

Luke smiled, and it was a much gentler, kinder smile than his usual smirk.

“Not any more,” he said. “We’ve mostly worked out a compromise we can both live with.”

“Really?”

“I go to his stupid hockey games, and he comes to my magnificent theatrical performances,” Luke said, then cracked up laughing. “No, but seriously. You can work things out, Jack. If you want to. Negotiation is a thing. Don’t take Henry as your role model.”

“Thanks, Luke.”

“No problem, little brother. Hey, since I’m so full of good advice tonight, I’m going to head round to Theo’s and practise what I preach for once. Give me a call if Eryn’s not with Dad and Henry when they get back.”

“I will.”

Luke hugged Jack tightly, then disappeared in a flash of green light.

Jack went down to the games room, where sure enough, Damon had fallen asleep in a nest of blankets and pavlova crumbs, John Wick Chapter Six still blaring out of the media centre. Jack wiped the chocolate and drool off his face with a tissue, and hefted him into his arms. He was still pretty short for ten, but it wouldn’t be much longer before he was too heavy to lift so easily. Jack carried him upstairs to his bedroom, loosened his collar, took off his shoes, and rolled him into bed. He was a good kid really, and it was nice getting to be the big brother for once, no longer the baby.

* * *

A few hours later, Rex came up to Jack’s bedroom.

“Is Eryn okay?” Jack asked.

“He will be,” Rex said. “We had a good talk. He’s got some stuff to figure out.”

“I’m sorry for causing all this trouble,” Jack said. “I’ll stay in school.”

Rex smiled. “I think you should. You don’t have to make all your decisions at once. But if you want to start by changing majors that would be okay.”

“You don’t mind?”

“All I want is for you to be happy, Jack,” Rex said. “All of you. Would I love it if you all came to work for me? Of course I would. But I hated my father. I only went to his funeral to make sure the old bastard was actually in the coffin. Rugercorp was the first big company I bought out and broke up, when I formed Rexcorp, and I did it on purpose, for spite. I don’t ever want you to feel that way. Any of you.”

“We could never feel that way,” Jack said. “Never.”

“I know,” Rex said. “But more than that. I’m vain enough to build a two hundred storey building in downtown Megalopolis and put my name on it, but I don’t need you boys to all be clones of me. If that was what I wanted, I’d have made you all dye your hair to match mine instead of settling for three natural redheads out of five. Or actually, I could have made _literal_ clones of myself in the lab. That would have been easier and cheaper. I want you to be who you are, Jack.”

“Even if who I am is a public school science teacher?” Jack asked.

“Even then,” Rex said.

“Even if I _really_ let the side down,” Jack said carefully, and this was the big one, the sixty four _million_ dollar question, “and occasionally go out superheroing with Ultraman and the Fairness Guild? I lied before, there _is_ a boy I like, but he keeps disappearing every time he’s on the verge of asking me out, and I’ve been checking the news, there’s usually an emergency somewhere the Young Olympians are dealing with at the same time.”

Rex gritted his teeth. “Even then. I’ll love you just the same, I promise.”

“Ultraman was right,” Jack said, and he’d never been happier to say something so outrageous. “You _are_ an amazing father.”

Rex tried to look intimidating, and failed utterly. “Now you’re pushing it.”

“Can you imagine Luke as a ginger?” Jack asked, suddenly remembering what Rex had said earlier. “And with his natural curls, not after an hour in the bathroom with a GHD straightener?”

“Good night, Jack,” Rex said, standing up to leave.

“I mean, _I_ could probably pull it off.”

“ _Good night_ , Jack.”

“Night, Dad. I love you.”


End file.
